Star Wars: A Phantom Dies
by LeeberSnowy
Summary: This is a theorists and creative look at what MAY happen in Episode Nine. Yes I ship Reylo in this, and yes smut is involved :)
1. Chapter 1

I'm dreaming. I must be dreaming. This is not the present day, and I am not on the Falcon. Chewy isn't snoring in the hammock below, and the Resistance are not within arms reach. There are so many voices chattering in the space around me, but I can't understand their words, and I feel sick inside but I don't know why. So sick I almost want to double over and expel my last meal, but I keep my head up and my eyes open, breathing desperately through my nose. The air smells of old blood and death, and the sky is raining fire and ash.

Sadness, guilt and suffering wash over me so strongly that I slip carelessly to my knees, and cry out. Why I feel such overwhelming grief, I don't know immediately, but I hear a voice behind me. Soft, insistent and inviting.

"Come," it says, "Let the past die." Slowly, I get up and turn around. Snoke stands there, a black cloak blowing around in the fiery air. He is smiling, "Come, my son."

The dream shifts just as I'm realizing I am not myself. I am not Rey the Scavenger turned …well, whatever I am now. Here in this lucid but dreamlike moment, I'm someone else. And I'm fairly certain that someone is Kylo Ren. The scene has shifted to a younger Millenium Falcon, and a family. I'm small, I am loved. But then that too, is shifting away, as though being pulled into darkness, and I whirl back around to a more familiar sight. White lights line the walls of a First Order elevator, and clunky cuffs hold my wrists together in front of me. I turn instinctively to my left and _he_ is there. The current Supreme Leader and my greatest enemy.

And I am Rey again.

Is this a dream? A memory? I stare around me for some sort of clue. And suddenly he turns to face me pointedly. Instead of me approaching him with appeals, calling him Ben and sharing what I'd seen of his future, he filled the space to me himself. The fixed height of his shoulders and his brows in a frown of contempt made me back up until I hit the wall.

"What are you doing?" he says, his eyes burning into me as they tended to do. "I thought we agreed this was connection over."

I swallowed, "I can't control it when I sleep."

He swallowed too, and glanced up and around us. "Is that what this is?" he murmured to himself, then he reached out and grabbed me, not hard, but around my throat. "No."

I could feel his fingers, cold and sweaty against my skin. "Let go-"

"Tell me where your infantile band of refuse are." he pressed in harder.

"You won't hurt me," I shake, and a tear down my face tries to betray me.

I kick out at his immense body but he dodges me, letting go of his hold. I run, and get nowhere, as though the doors themselves are false and this room is all that exists. He's shadowing me, but I can tell he doesn't know what this is either, by the way his eyes keep shifting all around the ceiling. I grab for something, anything to fight back, but my hands are still cound together. Then suddenly _the_ lightsabre springs into my hands, inexplicably whole again. I yipe and nearly drop it, and then I hold it up at him.

His face changes, and his shoulders relax. He laughs, actually laughs and says, "There is something very twisted going on here."

"Just stay back," I wave it, so familiar in my cuffed hands.

His brows shift into something that pains me to see, and he steps closer, pressing the hilt against his chest. "Do it."

I shake my head and close the weapon fast, tossing it to the ground. Before I can do anything else, his hands are around my waist, and the back on by head, and I am being brought so close. His forehead is brushing against mine, but he's trembling. His powerful frame seems suddenly to be unsure, and for so long we stand like that, my wrists pressed between our chests like the last barrier. But his eyes, are all over me, and eventually I take his collar in my fingers and pull in.

As soon as our lips meet, he changes. Dimly, I'm aware of elevator wall against my back. Fingers are entwining in the folds of my tunic, tugging it off my shoulder. His lips fall there, and lower to the wrapped linen of my chest, lifting me and breathing me in. Then suddenly he stops, growling at himself, and slamming his hand on the wall beside my face. My breathing is shallow, and my heart is racing. All I know is, I want more.

He pulls back enough to meet my eyes. "Stay away from me, Rey."

"I didn't mean to-"

"I am the monster," he looks both afraid and terribly dangerous all once, and he is shaking so badly that I feel a physical wave emitting from him. "And I'm not sure I can control it."

"Ben, you can." I say as he still stands leaning his hands against the wall. "I feel it."

I try to move my arms awkwardly, but he shoves me back so hard I feel like I will bust straight through the walls, and I do! but there is no impact. I float away, watching him grow smaller in the darkness, watching me with the same eyes he had when I closed the Falcon. And then I roll over, awake at last. The sound of breakfast being made, and repairs being done in the Flacon are all around, and my hands are free... but I can still smell him, and feel his lips. I close my eyes and sigh hard. Then I rise for the day.


	2. The Crypt

"Why did it have to be The Crypt?" whispered Rose. "Why not Oovo IV the prison moon? Or even just the precinct on Canto Bite?"

Fin answered, "They won't even let us land on Cantonica anymore."

"You're right. We are probably banned for life," Rose's laugh was clunky.

Rey adjusted herself slightly to remind them both she was still there. The engineer and the stormtrooper turned resistance hero certainly had a close connection that made her feel out of place again. But this was not the time to let those thoughts cloud her purpose. Blaster in her hand, Rey was supposed to be practicing her new power on this mission, even if it made her as nervous as Rose.

"We are close," Poe Damerin and BB8 were watching the flanks and made up the rest of the team. Though he was the newly appointed leader of the Resistance, the human pilot looked more like a scroungy junk trader at the moment. "Two levels down from here. We're right on top of him."

"Alright lets take the ladder down, I don't trust the elevators," Rey told them.

"Here!" Rose called from where she'd found a portal to the service ladders.

Poe put the blaster at his side, "Great." Two levels below, they descended through the rotting prison. Rey felt each and every presence as they went, shakily as though holding a great armful of parcels, and losing some… She was still learning this part of the Force. And there were so many other elements she hadn't even started on yet. Luckily the ability to distract was a skill she felt she'd mastered now, and used a distant mechanical "malfunction" to pull away more than one patrol guard on this mission. Poe was already working on the door, with BB8 making the most progress.

Finn slipped back to them from where he'd had gone ahead, "Someone's coming."

"I have this." Rey answered at once. "You watch the other way." With a fluidity she'd learned in time, she whipped the staff off her back and gripped it, rushing the corridor to meet who ever it was head on.

"Or I could join you and the guys will watch that way," Rose suddenly was beside her, hair bouncing with it's stubborn flip.

Rey huffed and tried to out-walk the girl. "I don't really need help"

"Oh, neither do I." She replied, with her determined cheerfulness, "fully capable, me! Can you actually believe we are here? Part of the Resistance?"

"Look," Rey began, "I'm not-"

"Shh!" Rose cut in.

Down the corridor an oblivious Drovian guard came whistling, freezing in shock when he saw them. Rey threw her hand out, lifted the bewildered guard into the air and slammed him into the wall. He slid to the ground, unconscious.

"Whoa," breathed Rose, her eyes trailing over Rey nervously.

An alarm blazed out with sound and flickering lights, making them both jump, and Finn suddenly pushed between them. "What happened?" he asked just as a radio started to go off, and a clear voice from it demanded a report. They glanced at each other, at a loss at first, then Fin rushed over and picked it up. "Thank you. It's all good here, everyone is fine, situation normal." He winced, "How are you?"

Rey shot a look at Rose who shrugged.

Static. And then, "Get the bloody alarm off then!"

"Right, right." Fin scrambled, "I am ON that." And he dropped the radio fast, saying, "Why did you let me do that?"

Poe jogged up on them with BB8 rolling beside him. "Rose, can you get that off? Rey. Huh, well done."

Rey swallowed, "Thanks." She hadn't meant to do quite that, but she was still learning, she supposed. The Jedi books had taught her more than Luke and Maz combined, but she wasn't sure she was dividing her time right.

"Here!" Poe continued. "I found the right cell-block."

"Go ahead." Finn called, "I will stay with Rose." Rey looked back once, following Poe down the corridor, but as usual Finn was occupied by the spunky mechanic.

"Okay, he should be right here on the left." Poe said, "Ah, BB8?"

The cell they were looking for was there, but more secure than the others, with an extra door, which didn't seem to intimidate the little droid one bit. He scooted past, and plugged in, while almost immediately the doors parted and they could at least see into the cell, through glowing red, energized bars. Within the cell, someone stood up from where they had been excessing on the floor. For a moment they stared at the inmate.

"Are you the one they call J. Fett?" Rey asked, hiding her hand behind her back and folding all her fingers, but two. "You will tell us."


	3. Crystal

Rey didn't want to sleep. There was a chance something would happen, like the night before, an unwanted breach of the barriers they'd set. She and Kylo Ren. She was so afraid to be trapped again in that space with him, and it didn't have anything to do with the physical threat he suggested, although it should have. It was the fear of her thoughts running wild in those moments, and of giving into them. This was the fear that kept her feet moving, long after everyone else slept, and brought her eventually to the cockpit.

"Chewie," she smiled wearily.

He bellowed at her in greeting, and she slumped into the co-pilot seat. "Everything steady?"

With emotion he seemed to be saying that _nothing_ was steady without Han there, or that was what Rey imagined. She watched the stars outside the glass and wondered how many late nights the duo had spent here searching, smuggling, adventuring… When she woke with a start it was to find the sound of the couple of Resistance members left on the Falcon, preparing for the next recruitment mission.

She jumped up to her feet and ran to where they were grouped for a briefing. As usual Poe Dameron was leading it, and probably had seen Rey asleep in his spot beside Chewie already. She was positive he wouldn't let her join this team, but she had to try. Again he got to the end of his huddle, telling each player their job, and again he caught site of Rey and shook his head apologetically. Again she watched everyone leave, nervous and excited to be doing something for the galaxy. And of course, again- Rey felt lonely.

Out of habit she wandered into the living quarters to fiddle with the pieces of her once formidable weapon. Trying to fix it was as sporadic a task as controlling her own thoughts. First, Rey knew nothing about Kyber crystals, or _why_ they were so important, but she knew that this one's was still intact, and that was something. She'd never realized how much it meant, now that it was gone, and she had to rely on her use of the Force only. The light-sabre had kept her grounded to something, as an anchor to the force. Maybe it did belong to the Supreme Leader, who she was trying hard no to think of, but then- when it flew into _her_ hands instead of Ren's, it had seemed to _choose_ her. Either way, it had to be fixed if she was going to be truly effective.

Juice in a cup, and legs folded together, she began, careful as always not to touch the sensitive crystal inside. By now Rey had tried many times to weld the two shards together, to no avail. Desperation and some boredom actually, had her looking inside the sabres hilt for more clues. There was something under the crystal, she was sure of it, but even a tiny touch for the most fleeting second brought on those hollow voices from the past. The thought of it scared her, like it had in Maz's palace.

Rey was deep in these sorts of thoughts when her screwdriver in fact slipped on the metal and stuck into the crystal fast. Instantly the Falcon fell away into darkness, like she'd dropped off a cliff. But then the seat under Rey was gone, and even the sabre in her hands. She slammed to a hard stone ground, and scrambled to her feet, unhurt and deep within Maz's palace once more. A younger palace too, clean and with a quarter of the clutter. The box Rey had found the sword in was in the centre of an otherwise empty room and Maz hersel was locking it away. She suddenly stopped, straightened and turned around. It was like she could see Rey when she said, "These are the next steps."

Everything shifted again. The world seemed to twirl on her, and an incredible light and balance filled her soul. She was in a grand place and could sense the mastery of others around her, glancing around she saw Jedi of all different ages and species dressed in the robes of apprentices and masters alike. The site towered above her, and outside the giant windows a city stretched out as though it would never end. Students walked past and through her, but one student in particular sitting nearby on a bench caught her attention.

He had to be twelve, a sandy haired boy, bent over in concentration, as a single long braid hung down across his face. The tip of his tongue was in the corner of his mouth, so focused was he, and Rey smiled at him, and approached. But as she came closer she saw the metal hilt of a lightsaber. _Her_ light-sabre.

"Hey!' she said, and the boy looked up, as though he'd heard her. Only he was frowning hard, and when Rey spun around to see what the upset was, she gasped. Kylo Ren stood there, sleepy and dressed in black pants only, gazing past her at the Jedi-in training.

"What is this?" his low voice echoed to her, louder than the surroundings.

"I…" Rey blinked at him. "I was repairing my light-sabre when-"

" _My_ light-sabre," Kylo shot her a wry look, but then his eyes shifted back to the boy. "Only it was his, first."

Rey turned back to the boy with the largest shiver. "Vader?"

"Anakin," Kylo answered. "He was just Anakin here."

The boy looked all around him and then shook his head and concentrated on the machine in his lap. Rey glanced up at the pillars stretching up into darkness, the long crimson drapes and the droids rushing around, shining and brand new. "What is this place?' she asked.

Kylo came in closer to her. "It's the Jedi temple on Coruscant, a long time ago…"

Rey glanced up at the Sith nervously. "Why is the force showing this to us?"

They both heard the anguished screaming next and ducked when a molten wave of lava swept away the beautiful temple. Rey heard a woman's voice cry out, "You're going down a path I can't follow…"

But the darkness and sudden destruction shifted into a blurr of sights, hardly able to settle on one before shifting to the next, and only Kylo Ren remained the constant thing. The scene settled at last into a balcony in soft summer light, raining flower petals under a sprawling log branched tree. Two people stood in front of a glistening lake, while nearby stood 3PO and R2, Luke's droids. Rey was about to speak when she was unexpectedly floored with an emotion from Kylo Ren, seeping around her like a steady flood. She turned to see his face, awash in confusion.

"This… this didn't happen," he said, stared at the people.

"What's wrong?" Rey asked, and took a closer look at the two. One was a lovely human girl draped in white lace, like a bride and the other was that same little boy, Anakin, only he'd grown as tall as Kylo. His hand was no longer the human one that she'd seen seconds ago, it was machine, but grasped onto the girl as though she were his redemption. Rey felt almost guilty watching them embrace, but the girl was hard to look away from, graceful, powerful and beautiful all at once. "Why do you think this didn't happen?" she asked Ren.

Ren passed her, "Jedi weren't supposed to love, to marry, or to have families."

Rey frowned. It seemed immediately wrong. "How did you think Luke and Leia existed?"

Kylo glanced over his shoulder at her, and despite herself she blushed. "Most think Vader forced the former queen of Naboo, then killed her as soon as she delivered."

Rey felt her lungs close with the thought and she peered around Ren's massive body to look more at the newlyweds, foreheads together in the setting sun. They seemed hopelessly in love. It was so bittersweet, with only the droids to see them, and it occurred to Rey that they were secret lovers. That this was a ceremony of silence, a love forbidden. No wonder the boy became so torn, to become Vader, Rey thought, no wonder he found redemption in his son, in the end.

"But then Luke-." Rey began. Ren half turned, then looked back at them, entranced.

"Vader was only told about Luke, and that he'd died with the mother," Ren swallowed, "Padme. But she gave to the Jedi for safe keeping. My mothe-" Ren stopped himself, "Leia was kept secret, hidden away from Vader by Kenobi for all those years."

"Kenobi?"

Rey knew it was shifting now, before it even did. The scene went black, and a familiar voice, accented and calm said, "Rey, this is the next step."

The sound of a light-sabre cracking open made her jump, and a single strip of red light sprang up in the void. Heavy, mechanically controled breathing filled the dark space around her and a figure caught in the crimson light. She knew the shape of the mask, the eyes…. And then he was marching towards them by the red light of his light-sabre, one gloved hand outstretched. Rey backed up so fast, she hit Ren's wide chest before she remembered he was even there. As the phantom Vader loped closer, Ren took her waist and threw her behind him, to face the apparition alone.

But Vader melted away, replaced very suddenly by light all around. All that was left was them. Light, and them. She watched Ren's frame shifting, and his hands gripping and re-gripping, and she could feel a binding cord of confusion wrapped around him, like it burned. Then he dropped to his knees, and before she'd fully decided what to do, her feet were moving. His dark head fell into his hands and she felt a biting pain all throughout her when she reached out to him.

"Ben," she said sadly, and his head lifted, only enough for him to stare at her feet.

She eased closer. Like a kitten around a mean dog, she felt, or a porg approaching Chewie. When it was clear she was pushing through some barriers the Supreme Leader sat up and slowly lowered his hands to his sides. His conflict quieted, and she held in a small smile, venturing closer still. It was working. His eyes were on her, and not breaking away, even for a second.

"You keep trusting me," he said softly. "You shouldn't."

Rey pushed herself even closer, knowing that the things he was so damaged from would fall away fast, from his mind. It was only then she actually recalled the dream she'd eavesdropped on a few nights before, and the way it had ended. A self conscious flush returned to the tops of her cheeks, but she stepped so close that her feet were against his knees, still on the white ground. He reach out at once and he pulled her to his chest by her wide leather belt, too fast, almost too forcibly, his hands keeping her waist against his chest firmly.

But then his eyes changed. It started when his brows drew together, and his deep green eyes glistened. She felt the sadness inside of him grow, and her own empathy rose to meet it. Lifting her hand up to his face, Rey traced the scar from his forehead over black eyebrows, to his cheek, and he closed his eyes as the peace spread between them. His face relaxed, and while he was thus, Rey studied it. She'd maimed him. Torn him apart from top down, and she felt that something similar was going in inside him too. But he was like a dark angel from Iego in the bright glowing light, his skin shining, his curls were bed-ravaged and so _human_. Tears blurred her eyes and when he opened his again, she smiled softly at him.

"I can't stay here." He whispered.

"Why not?"

He looked around him, like a hunted predator. "There's too much light." When his gaze rose back up to her, he was working his mouth nervously.

Rey took a large, decided breath and said, "Then bring me into the dark."

************************************** Smut warning******************************************************

The last thing she saw was the uncertainty leave his eyes, his brows relax. The light around them dimmed, to a single source from somewhere above them, and the control of whatever was happening shifted to him and him alone. Seconds of self doubt clawed at her, where she pictured herself back in the First Order cuffs, but this all was swept away as soon as Ren moved. As he got to his feet, he lifted Rey off her's. Gently, but with intensity.

He lifted some fingers and reality shifted ever so slightly. The ground rose up, under her back with a soft puff of air and Ren was over her, instead of against, with his knees settling on either side and his fingers entwining with hers. She could actually feel her heart slamming, and drew in a loud breath when he stretched her arms, and pinned her hands to the floor above her head. His eyes searched her body first, with an eagerness that said he'd been wanting to for a while. Holding her wrists easily with one broad hand, he waved the other impatiently and her clothing loosened. Unraveled, actually, and abandoned her completely, leaving him hovering over her, skin so very close to touching skin.

He was frozen there, as though something were keeping him from moving forward. If she reached out in her mind she could feel the something too. It was like the first time they'd seen each other face-to face, in the space with them, a strong wave of feeling, of heightened emotion. His own reaction to it was what she was most conscious of, and especially the moments when he seemed to gulp in nervously. Her own fear was quieted by it, and her breathing was controlled if her heartbeat was not. She worked one of her hands free from his grip and laid it along the side of his face, half covered by his dark shroud of hair.

"I feel it too." She said. "Ben, don't be afraid."

"I'm not afraid for me, Rey," he answered.

She smiled, because it felt incredible when he said her name out loud. "Why are you afraid then?"

"You should stay away from me, and from the dark."

"But… You saved me."

"You saved _me_." He remarked softly but Rey was stopped by the words and he seemed to be realizing their impact too. For a long time he wrestled with what he would say next, and Rey could feel the unstableness inside him. "And you call me Ben," he said, his voice cracked very subtly.

Rey broke her other hand free and pulled him right into her chest. He was so massive that it felt rather strange but he clung to her, hard. There wasn't a precise moment when they started kissing, he just began on her body and it led to more. As this was one of those areas where she had very little know-how, it was easy to let him keep his all desired control. Easy and it also stirred something deep in her stomach.

The kisses moved away from her mouth, lower and lower down her neck, and shoulders. Slowing over her breasts and nipples until her pelvis suddenly curled up into his, without control. He lifted his lips off of her, slowly, staring her in the eyes and smiling softly. Then his long fingers ran up her leg and slipped between her thighs. Before she could properly react to that, he'd pushed them deep inside her, and she gasped out loud. And then his kisses _joined_ his fingers and Rey felt like she was at his every command. Never knowing this sort of direct physical pleasure before, and never wanting something to continue, more.

Whatever she didn't know, Ben made up for. When he spun her around to her hands and knees, it was done gently but firmly, like she was a travellers trunk. He covered her again, arm over arm and lips against her shoulder, but between her legs, his fingers were making way for something else. Something far too big. Rey tried to pull away, but he held her still and she felt the strong threads of the force bend around him and slip over her, as though binding them together with a cord. She surrendered to it, push right back, and this time it was he who gasped out.

There was pain, but it was washed away with waves of something so much stronger. A warmth inside that was building. Kylo Ren, her supposed enemy, was moving against her, achingly slow at first, and then with building fluidly until she almost burst with heat. He lifted her up, hands traveling, still deep inside her, and the waves grew stronger. There was no controlling the sounds she made, tucked away in this hiding place with him, when he started to move faster. Trembling at times, and almost pushy at others, he took her every way she knew of and a few she didn't. When she thought it was over, it wasn't, and he never let go of her once, even when he was spent and they were breathless.

A time passed. Whether it was an hour, or ten minutes only, Rey didn't know, but she reflected on everything that had just happened in that time, from the moment she saw him on the island to the presenet tangle of arms and lips. The line between them was completely gone now, and she felt like a part of something more at last. But she was reminded then, that this was not reality, and the smallest feeling that the scene was once again shifting, made her eyes fly open.

"No," she whispered.

"Easy, Rey. " He held her tighter, but the scene was dimming.

"No!" she cried, "Stay with me, Ben."

"I can't stop it!" she heard his voice fade, and she woke with a start.

She was on the bench in the Falcon again, and everyone was still gone. Her juice was still frosty with cold and the light-sabre lay in pieces on the ground. Her clothes were still on her body as if they'd never been unwound, and all that was left of the forbidden act they'd just done was the lingering feeling of him deep inside her. Rey held her stomach and cried.


End file.
